the rachel maddow show starts right now. good evening, rachel. >> it was fantastic, chris. and the zinc. well then >> thanks at-home for joining us this hour. happy to have you here. in april 1960, in memphis, tennessee, the reverent dr. martin luther king the man who killed him was james earl ray, seen here in handcuffs. james earl ray was a rabid segregationist. he was a real racist. he was kicked out of the army in the late '40s. he'd been in and out of prison for years. he'd actually escaped from prison in missouri, in 1967, the year before he killed king. he spent time in mexico. spent time in california. by 1968, he was reportedly intoxicated with the reactionary campaign of george wallace, the segregationist alabama governor, who ran for president in 1968 on an anti-civil rights,

pro-segregation, white supremacist platform. james earl ray volunteered on the wallace for president campaign. even beyond that, he was just increasingly committed to the racist cause more broadly. and in the spring of 1968, james earl ray moved to atlanta. he had been living on the west coast. moved across the country to atlanta, where martin luther king lived and where he preached at ebenezer baptist church. james earl ray appears to have gone to atlanta, specifically in pursuit of dr. king. and in april of 1968, king took a trip from atlanta to memphis, tennessee. it was widely publicized he was going to do it. he went to memphis to support the striking sanitation workers there. james earl ray followed martin luther king to memphis. and he killed him there. he shot and killed dr. king, as

king stood on the balcony of a motel in memphis, the lorraine motel. and for much of america, it must have seemed like time stopped in that moment. part of our history absolutely did stop in that moment. but it didn't end for james earl ray. because after james earl ray shot martin luther king on that balcony in memphis in 1968, he got away. he got in his car, drive away. drove back to atlanta. spent three more days driving north. he crossed the u.s. border into canada. he stayed in canada for a month. somehow got himself at least one fake passport there. he through to europe. spent some time in portugal of all places. ended up in london. it wasn't until two months after he assassinated martin luther king that james earl ray was finally arrested. he was arrested at the airport in london, as he was preparing to fly on to another country.

james earl ray was extradited back to the united states to face trial. he admitted he did it. he confessed. pled guilty. he was sentenced to 99 years in prison for the assassination of martin luther king. but then a couple of things of note happened thereafter. one thing to note that happened thereafter, he escaped from prison. he had previously been an escapee and even after he was sentenced for killing martin luther king, he escaped again. he escaped from prison in tennessee. he managed to last about three days outside before he was recaptured. that tacked another year on to his 99-year sentence. another thing to know about him, post conviction, post sentencing, is that after his trial, after his sentencing, he changed lawyers. he got himself a new lawyer. a like-minded lawyer, a segregationist, a bit of a weirdo. and his new lawyer not only represented him during the time he escaped from prison, but he

and his new lawyer also cooked up this scheme by which they would recant james earl ray's confession. even though he confessed, he pled guilty, they took it back. they said he hadn't done it. they don't know why he confessed. it was crazy. a moment of madness. he actually didn't do it. and instead, they cooked up a scheme they would blame the assassination of martin luther king jr. on a mysterious man named raul. who is raul? there's no raul. they made up that much about it but never got much further with that. >> james earl ray is in prison in tennessee. the last of the five men that broke out with him friday night was caught this morning. and today, ray's lawyer was on-hand. and so was eric burns to report on what the lawyer had to say. about his client. >> this is jack kershaw. he is james earl ray's attorney and he talked to ray this morning. he told reporters that ray is okay physically, exhausted

mentally and sorry he tried to escape. and he said, there was no conspiracy to help ray escape. >> i think we can discount any outside help. if there was outside help, there would be something waiting in the backyard. >> did he plan the escape? >> no. >> who did? >> don't know. >> ray refused to talk to these investigators before the house assassination committee today. but he will talk to them later, kershaw says. kershaw says he has a picture of the man named raul. according to ray, raul was the brains behind the plot to kill martin luther king. kershaw says he will show this picture some time in the next two months, after he has asked the court for a new trial for his client. >> oh, yes. a picture of raul, the real killer. there was no raul. james earl ray, and his lawyer, jack kershaw, the man in the

light suit and the colonel sanders hair. they didn't succeed with this plan to get james earl ray a new trial to blame the assassination of martin luther king on some made-up guy named raul. none of it worked. he never escaped again. james earl ray died in prison in 1998. what happened to his lawyer? what happened to jack kershaw? interesting story, it turns out. around the same time that his client, james earl ray was dieing in prison, while serving his sentence for assassinating martin luther king, around that same time, 1998, jack kershaw, james earl ray's lawyer, sort of started a new vocation. i don't know if it's anything he ever got paid for. but it was his self-actualized

self. he was the founder of the league of the south, in 1994. the neo-confederate post segregationist group. he founded it in 1994. in 1998, when his famous client was dying in prison, being sentenced for killing martin luther king, around 1998, that lawyer, jack kershaw, completed his masterpiece, his artistic masterpiece. a statue. a gigantic 25-foot-tall statue that he made maybe with bathroom caulk, household materials of some kind. i say it's his masterpiece because i think it's the best he can do. it was terrible. doesn't mean i think it was good, honestly, it was terrible. but it was his masterpiece. a buddy of his even said on the record, to a local news reporter, that he, too, believed that jack kershaw was a pretty terrible artist.

he, too, believed this sculpture was pretty awful. but he was nevertheless proud to put it up on his property in tennessee for the worst possible reasons. >> as an artist, mediocre. as a thinker, he was way ahead of a lot of people of his time. jack got some materials that i use to make bathtubs with and he started with a butcher knife. that's the end result, what you see out there right now. >> to a lot of people, this monument is a symbol of racism. >> any monument is a symbol of racism if you are going to make it a symbol of racism. i have been accused of being racist, if i was racist, why do i have so many blacks working for me? consider this the sixth largest nation in the world -- >> i still consider this, meaning tennessee, to be the confederate states of america, says the man.

that is how he explained why he put up that sculpture we just showed you, made from bathtub caulk and stuff, with a butcher knife. that's why he put up that statue, that was created by the lawyer for the man who killed martin luther king. a man on a horse. there's no way you would know this, is a man named nathan bedford forrest. nathan bedford forrest was a plantation owner. a very wealthy slave trader. a general in the confederate army. after the civil war was over, he became the first grand wizard of the ku klux klan. that's why, for the past 20-plus years, since roughly 1998, there has been on the outskirts of nashville, tennessee this, hideous 25-foot-tall statue of the founder of the klan. sitting on a piece of private property overlooking interstate 65. you really can see it from i-65. and local residents, local

officials, have had a lot of consternation over this for the past 20 years. it's got all of these different flags from all of the various confederate states flying all around it, plus lots of confederate flags themselves. and nathan bedford forrest on his horse with a gun and a sword in the middle of it. local officials and local residents tried to persuade the state of tennessee, that the state could plant some tall trees along that part of the interstate to shield this thing from passing traffic. well, the guy on whose private property the statue sat, he said, if the state did try to occlude the view of that masterpiece from interstate 65, well, he had a plan. he would put all of his confederate flags on taller flag poles and do whatever it takes to keep this thing on view. >> got some 1,800-foot flag poles. i can put them up starting tomorrow.

they will have to build a hell of a wall and hell of a bunch of trees to block all that. slavery was the first form of social security. if you stop and think about it a minute, it was a cradle to the grave proposition. they never had it so good as far as job security, to begin with. it wasn't the best of job security, but it had benefits. >> yes. slavery sure had some benefits. so, why not honor it this way, with a 25-foot-tall founder of the klan confederate general statue and all of the confederate flags. that man, his name is bill dorris, who owned the land. who put up the klan founder statue on his private property, made by his friend jack kershaw who represented the assassin of martin luther king.

this guy bob died a year ago. his death made some oh, isn't that cute headlines at the time. in his will, he left $5 million for the care of his border colie who is actually an adorable dog. he left $5 million to cover the care of his 12-year-old dog if the rest of her life, which is all. the thing is he didn't actually have $5 million. he wrote that in his will. but he didn't have $5 million to give to the dog or anybody else. the executor of court had to get that figure reduced. because there wasn't that kind of money to give to the dog. it appears that the man may have died in debt. a trailer park he owned near his home is being sold to pay off the debts of his estate. and it seems like -- just guessing here, spitballing here, but i'm guessing that maybe his three-acre parcel of land overlooking interstate i-65, the

one with the big nathan bedford forrest statue on it, that may need to be sold, as well, to pay off the debts against his estate. and the reason i'm guessing that property needs to be sold is that because -- today, finally, this morning, after this thing stood there for more than 20 years on the side of the interstate, after people painted it pink in 2017, they threw pink paint all over it. somebody else spraypainted the word "monster" on it last year in 2020. after all of the consternation and after having the founder of the klan looming 25 feet tall as the gate keeper to nashville, this morning, today, finally came down. the executor of this guy's will ordered the removal of the statue this morning. whether or not that finally happened today, because i suspect, it might be hard to sell that property with a giant, hideous pink klansman on it.

whether or not that was a property value decision on oak hill, tennessee this morning. frankly, everyone who owns property in oak hill, tennessee, probably saw the property values get a little boost today when the huge pink hideous klansman came down. heidi campbell, who petitioned to get this taken down told "the tennessean" newspaper today, this has been a national embarrassment. i'm so excited. this is great news. it's just so hurtful to people. not to mention, she said, quote, it's heinously ugly. fair enough. when the heinously ugly 25-foot-tall statue of the klan founder came down today in tennessee, some local news outlets reported that the statue was going to be held in storage or possibly put up for sale. but, yeah -- no. that thing is not going up for sale. it's not even make it in the

back of a pickup truck, let alone in a climate-controlled storage. it turns out, you can tell it from the way they took it down, it was made of toothpaste, it crumbled and fell apart as soon as they toppled it. so, now, it's gone. and you know, if you don't believe me this is still a sensitive subject for some people, look at what happened elsewhere in tennessee in the past few weeks. it was back in 2017, that another statue, actually a proper statue of the same ku klux klan grand wizard, another statue of nathan bedford forrest. forrest park, with two "r"s, named for nathan bedford forrest. the first ku klux klan grand wizard. there was a statue that memphis took down in 2017. there was one complication. nathan bedford forrest was

physically buried underneath it. nathan bedford forrest's body and his wife was under that statue in that memphis park. when they started digging after they took down the statue, it turns out, the directions they had weren't exactly right. they weren't directly under the statue. they were kind of under the plaza in front of where the statue had been. it took them a while hunting around to find the caskets. they did finally find the remains. they made a plan to rebury them this fall, a few weeks ago. look what they had to do to get it done. local nbc 5 in memphis, tennessee, got an exclusive look at this. this is astonishing. and, again, remember, this is the confederate general, wealthy slave trader, first grand wizard of the ku klux klan, nathan bedford forrest. >> all of it, with the remains of a man, reviled and revered and the weight of a city divided

on his shoulders, teller ordered his staff to place the caskets in two different vehicles. >> i had my staff leave the site, drive in different directions and i'll call you and tell you where. >> they drove around about 40 minutes to avoid anyone following them before taylor directed them to head to his mumford, tennessee, funeral home. taylor said he changed the locks on this room where he kept the remains. and he quietly reburied them in this munford cemetery. as he waited to learn where the forrests would be laid to rest permanently. when the forrest family decided to make columbia, tennessee, the location of the sons of confederate headquarters, taylor exhumed the remains once again. the remains were tucked inside period clothing and the family planned to stop at the site of one of forrest's civil war battle sites in columbia, but the family forrest attorney got a call. >> there was a security threat,

that the fbi wanted to make us aware of. and they asked that we not take that route and we not do the ceremony. >> taylor says they moved the remains in the cover of darkness september 16th, for a series of visitations, processions and the funeral and third burial of the couple. ceremonies attended by 4,000 people and the fbi, with facial recognition software in tow. >> they are still looking for insurrectionists. who stormed the capitol on january 6th and felt for whatever reason, the funeral of nathan bedford forrest might be a good place to find people who perhaps were in the capitol january 6th. >> photos from the ceremony showed some of the 500 civil war re-enactors. a riderless horse with backwards boots. >> this was taken from the balcony. this is the remains going into the mansion for the visitation. they had ladies mourning ladies dressed in all-black that carried his portrait from the mansion up to the gravesite.

>> more than 4,000 people, 4,000 americans, showed up for that. that was just a couple of months ago in tennessee, at the headquarters at the sons of confederate veterans in columbia, tennessee. and if you missed what the funeral director said there, he said the fbi was there. the fbi has not confirmed this. according to the guy that ran this whole ceremony, the fbi was there with facial recognition software, looking for insurrectionists. who stormed the capitol on january 6th. the fbi felt that for whatever reason the funeral of nathan bedford forrest might be a good place to find people that were perhaps in the capitol on january 6th. yeah. the funeral, the reburial of a confederate general and klan founder, might have been an attraction to the americans to our generation who did their part to overthrow the u.s. government by force.

tonight, there's news on the investigation of the january 6th attack. former president trump's chief of staff, mark meadows, announced he will no longer cooperate with the investigation. he's putting himself there be on a course to potentially be criminally prosecuted for contempt, if he continues to refuse to testify and refuses to hand over documents on what happened to the lead-up of january 6th. one legal adviser to trump, they're already pleading the fifth in the investigation. no signs that mark meadows might be pleading the fifth. we got word tonight that another long-time adviser to former president trump, roger stone, he is reportedly saying that he, too, will plead the fifth. we'll have more of that coming up tonight. but these touchstones, niece symbols of violent insurrections against the u.s. government, they're having their moment right now which may not be a

coincidence. just yesterday in richmond, virginia, they started dismantling the pedestal that once held the giant statue of the head of the confederate army, robert e. lee. that statue itself came down in september of this year. democratic virginia governor ralph northam announced this weekend that the pedestal on which the lee statue stood, that pedestal will start to come down in richmond. they apparently started to dismantle it yesterday. it will be gone by the end of the year. in july of this year, they brought down the robert e. lee statue that was pride of place in charlottesville, virginia. tall way back in 2016, high school students started a petition to have that robert e. lee statue taken down. the city council voted the following year it should be taken down. the whole question of what was going to happen to that statue was caught up in legal wrangling, neo-nazi white supremacist and confederate groups seized at the very threat

of their pretext of holding the unite the right rally in charlottesville. the statue at the center of that didn't come down until july of this year. since then, just a couple weeks ago, the klan and neo-nazi and neoconfederate groups that organized the riots in protest of that statue, having a plan to take it down, those groups were found liable to pay $25 million to the people who were hurt by the white supremacist rioters in charlottesville. look at what's happening in charlottesville right now. late last night, in a meeting that stretched into the early morning hours this morning, the charlottesville council took a vote on what to actually do with the statue. that robert e. lee statue they finally took down this summer in july, it's 1,100 pounds of bronze.

they did finally take it down from that square in town, five years after local high school students asked them to please take it down. four years after the council said they would. four years after neo-nazis and neoconfederates converged on the city to protest that decision. they finally took it down but what are you going to do with it. apparently, half a dozen groups approached the city saying they wanted the statue. they had something they wanted to do with it. last night, early this morning, in a unanimous vote, the charlottesville city council decided what to do with it. they decided that 1,100-pound robert e. lee statue will be given to a local african american heritage center that has a very, very specific plan for it. they're going to melt it. they're going to melt it down. ultimately, they say it will become a new public artwork about what charlottesville is like today. it will be about some new idea in charlottesville. but that new idea, what exactly they're going to put it down to,

what they're going to turn it into, that will come later, but for now, the only plan that everybody has agreed to is melt it. they're calling the project sword into -- change is hard. change is often so hard that it is unimaginable. until one day, you're driving down i-65 and look, it happened. one day, you're driving through the center of charlottesville, virginia, and hey, look, it happened. it feels impossible. it feels unimaginable. it feels intractable. and then, it's done. lots to come tonight, stay with us.

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> here's some little telltale signs, that you can discern, even at a distance, that the united states may be under new management compared to the previous four years. first of all, before his one-on-one meeting with russian

president vladimir putin today, president biden called a bunch of our european allies. last night, he called france, germany, italy and the uk. the leaders from all five countries got on the phone together to get on the same page to get out the concerns of putin's buildup on the border of ukraine, so biden could talk to them about the agenda before this meeting with putin. as soon as the meeting was over, he called them back to fill them in on what happened, to make sure that the u.s. is on solid footing with our allies. as russia once again threatens to invade a country in europe. also, this is a smaller process. but perhaps it's a hopeful sign today after the biden/putin meeting was over. we, the american public, heard about what happened on that call from the u.s. government before we heard about it from the kremlin. and that shouldn't be that big a deal. but for the last four years, that never happened under president trump. under president trump, if he had any contact with the russian

government, even if we had not known about it in advance, the kremlin would always give us the first word about what happened. we would find out our president had a meeting with putin, what the russians said they had talked about. we would always find out about it because of a press release from the kremlin. this time it was our government, it was the u.s. government, that was first to describe what happened. maybe that's not the biggest thing in the world, but it is a change and they are among the signs that things are being handled differently. while our white house is certainly under new management right now, while our president is different, russia's president is the same. and russian president vladimir putin does appear once again, to be relishing this moment on the world stage, when he is once again got everybody afraid of him. wondering what it is that he is going to do. is it possible right now to suss out whether russia is going to invade ukraine and expand the

existing war or start a whole new level of war there. the white house made sounds today after this call there are things we can do in response, that would be crippling for russia, that would be terrible. stuff we never contemplated doing to them the last time they invaded ukraine, in 2014. is that true? is that spin? is that bluster? putin clearly started this. he appears to be testing the u.s. government and the international community to see what he can get away with it. he has 175,000 troops massed on the border with ukraine. what is the right way for the u.s. government to be handling this? joining us now is fiona hill. she's the top expert on the national security council under president trump from 2017. she is the author of "there's nothing for you here," finding opportunity in the 21st century. thank you for making time to be here tonight.

dr. hill, thanks for making time tonight. >> thanks so much, rachel. glad to be with you. >> let me ask you if i'm framing this the right way. it seems to me, from just the layman's perspective, that president putin has the world's attention. and he got one-on-one attention from the president of the united states today. and he's got the whole world guessing as to whether or not he's going to do something crazy, militarily, toward ukraine. but he seems to be enjoying and has been seeking the attention he got from it. is it fair to portray it that way? >> well, he certainly did want to get attention, but he wants attention for a particular purpose. putin has been signaling for quite some period time, going back over several administrations, in fact, that he wants to see some kind of new security arrangement in europe. and ukraine is part of that. in many respects, coming up this month to the 30th anniversary to the dissolution of the soviet union, the end of the cold war, definitively, 30 years of independence of ukraine and

other countries like ukraine that wants parts of the soviet union. and putin is saying, we didn't solve the end of the cold war. at the end of other wars, we had an agreement of how europe will be divided up. i want that agreement now. they've been signaling it for many years, before handing it over to different presidencies. this is the latest iteration of this. >> how does threatening ukraine militarily, occupying parts of ukraine, seizing parts of ukraine for russia threatening to do even more of that now, how does that factor into that strategic pull that he has? >> well, ukraine is a critical part of this. putin has signaled many times, including recently, in a major speech, he considers ukraine to be part of russia, an extension of russia. he said that ukrainian and russian people are one of the same. that ukraine belongs to russia. ukraine is in russia's sphere of influence. and so ukraine needs to be part

of this new decision of european security arrangement. he is demanding that president biden, as he has for previous presidents of the united states, sit down and basically flesh this out. he is hoping that today's teleconference was part of that process. >> in terms of the balance of interest, if as you say, he considers ukraine to be integrally part of russia, something that spiritually cannot be separated from russia, that ukraine is his, that ukraine and russia must be one, the united states looks at ukraine as an ally but doesn't have as much strategic connection to russia does. it's an imbalance of power there. putin understands that. is he testing how far the united states and our allies will go to defend ukraine? i mean, obviously, the united states is not going to go to war with russia in order to defend ukraine. everybody keeps saying that up and down. but short of war, the united states presumably has more options than we have exercised

in the past. is this an effort to flesh out what those might be and do you sense that the biden administration will be willing to do things that they haven't been willing to do before to dissuade this aggression? >> you're right, rachel. you framed this in the right way. this is what putin is doing. he is probing and testing. he is making it clear that if he decides it is necessary, he will keep us guessing whether he has made that kind of a decision, that he is poised to do much more damage to ukraine. and the forces we see right there, and there's all of this available information from public satellite imagery, for example, we can see he might be poised to, for a major invasion of ukraine. and that's the goal he is trying to push into thinking he would do this. and again, we have to treat it seriously because he's done things like this in the past, as you say. he's already annexed crimea, and has moved parts of ukraine to

the dunbas region. are we ready to acquiesce in this? what president biden has done teed, you laid it out, showing that the united states and its allies, which is serious in resisting it. ukraine has been an independent country for 30 years. it has agency here, sovereignty. and the united states is not in any kind of position to bargain away europe on ukraine security. the biden administration is certainly framing things in the way that one would expect and hope and anticipate in responding to this. >> fiona hill, former top russia expert on the national security council, the author of "there is nothing for you here: finding opportunity in the 21st century," of every book written by anybody in the trump administration is the one definitely to read. thank you for your time and insight tonight. it's a real honor to have you here. >> thanks, rachel. thank you. > got much more to come here tonight. stay with us.

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> at least 22 states have detected the new omicron variant of the coronavirus since the first case was identified last week. public health experts say that's sure to go up. we don't know much about the variant yet. it could be the most contagious, the most easily transmitted version of the virus we have encountered. we don't know. we'll see. we don't know if it causes more or less severe illness than the delta variant that dominates now. if in fact omicron is more contagious, well it will take over here soon enough then and we'll know soon enough about its characteristics. even before omicron takes hold, though, we have got 99.9% of u.s. cases that are delta, regardless of omicron, even before omicron gets here in significant numbers. the case count from delta variant covid cases is climbing really aggressively right now, particularly in the midwest and the northeast, as winter sets in. and i want to look for a second

at what's going on in michigan. because this is two pieces of data from michigan that are bad in any combination, but really bad in sequence. last week, michigan hit its highest hospitalization ever. hospitalizations in michigan reached their highest point ever last week. the previous record was set like seven months ago. so, highest hospitalizations ever last week. then this week, they reached the highest number of active cases ever. think about that sequencing. once you get infections, then you get reported cases. once you get reported cases, you get people turning up sick. once you get people turning up sick, then you get hospitalization numbers, then after that, you get death numbers. michigan is already at its highest hospitalization ever. the week after that, they get the highest numbers ever. the delta variant, before omicron gets here, is filling up

hospital beds all across michigan, pushing the hospital system to its brink. the system in michigan is not good. it's as if your house at the shore was already under water and you just learned, we're under water. but it's only low tide right now. the tide is coming in. this is going to get worse. it's a bad combination of events. that's where michigan is. and part of the reason it's worth worrying about michigan, is the state is getting a huge amount of federal help. the federal government has deployed three emergency teams of health care workers to hospitals in michigan. things are still getting worse. look at the hospitalization graph again. highest it has ever been. at least one michigan doctor is saying the three federal teams that have been sent to help already are not enough to deal with that upward curve right now. according to the michigan pulmonologist, the numbers are picking up in the community and health care is bearing the brunt of that. we need the next team, meaning the next federal help team and the next team after that.

went further in a call for help from his colleagues who have retired. said, quote, we need people that may have taken a hiatus from health care for their own personal, physical and emotional health. we need those people to consider a return, so they can join us on the front line to get us through this very challenging time. the glass can only hold so much water. at some point, it will overfill. it is overfilling in several hospitals across the state right now. joining us now, is dr. paul bozyk. he is head of pulmonary and critical care hospital in the michigan hospital and vice chair of the board of the michigan state medical society. it's a real pleasure to have this time with you. thank you for making time to be here. >> thank you very much, rachel. appreciate being here. >> i'm worried about the two metrics in sequence, to have michigan hitting its highest hospitalization numbers ever and immediately thereafter to have its highest reported case numbers ever.

it feels -- that feels unsustainable almost on almost an immediate level. am i right to see it that way? or is there some piece of this that i'm missing or misconstruing? >> no, used got it exactly correct, rachel. unfortunately, it doesn't seem like the trajectory shows any signs of turning around. we have seen -- back to july 1, actually, infection rate greater than one. which means one person infects just more than one other person. and here we are in december, with infection rates as high as we have. that infection rate continues to be higher than one. so we expect the numbers to continue to climb. >> how much of the rise in case numbers that you see in michigan, how much is among the unvaccinated and how much in vaccinated numbers? obviously, there's breakthrough infections for sure. the good news is that people

don't get as sick. they're less likely to be hospitalized and less likely to get seriously ill and less likely to die. is there some silver lining? some reason for hoping that the cases are not breakthrough infections and people are not likely to end up in the hospital? >> that's certainly a possibly. i would tell you that 88% of michigan's population of hospitalized patients and 88% of those who go on to die are those who are not fully vaccinated. much more risk in the unvaccinated population. we like to imagine that some of those cases that are reported as infection are not those that are going to come into hospital because they are vaccinated because they are breakthrough cases. we do see a small number of those. those are particularly prevalent to those folks who are not boosted. if you've done the due diligence of getting vaccinated, please take that extra step and get the boost. the unfortunate reality is that 88% of folks that have to come to hospital are still unvaccinated.

and we're still looking for ways to reach that population, to help them learn and make the right choices, to vaccination. >> with michigan hospitals so full, with health care staffing levels being so critical, you making that personal call today, asking health care professionals who may have stepped away from the profession, because they retired or needed to get away, they needed to take care of themselves, asking people to consider rejoining to get back on the front lines. that really caught my attention today. that's part of the reasons we called you today. with resources stretched that far, that you have to make that plea to your colleagues, what is in the armor atarian? what else can hospitals do? what else can the state do? to make resources available for people that are sick? >> first, let me say, appreciate the emergency health care workers coming to michigan. that highlights the severity of our situation right now. no question. much appreciated. we have two asks for the community because on your question of what else hospitals

can do, we can control the things that we can control, which is trying to manage beds and trying to manage staffing to the best of our ability, allocate resources that we have, to optimize patient care. but beyond that, as i mentioned in the article, once the glass starts to overfill, we lose control of the situation. so, here's what my request was of the community. number one, just a personal appeal to those folks that had to step away from health care, particularly in-patient health care, who have really been the health care heroes. they were in march 2020. they still are today. there's just fewer of us at the bedside. if you have that skill set, if you have that talent, please consider returning to help our local health care facility. and number two to the community, you can play a great role in this by doing the things that we need to do to turn down the infection rate. those are things that have been well described. those are things like vaccinating. we talked about boosting

earlier. masking in indoor public spaces, please do it. avoid the public spaces to give yourself room away from other folks. right now, with the prevalence this high in the community, there's a high chance when you go out, you will encounter someone who is infected in the community. >> dr. paul bozyk, head of pulmonary and critical medicine at belmont medical hospital in michigan. thank you to you and your colleagues. this is a difficult time. thank you for taking the time to help us understand it tonight. >> thank you, rachel. appreciate it. >> we'll be right back. stay with us.

you might have seen these headlines last week. seemed like a very big deal at the time. mark meadows will appear before the january 6th panel. meadows agrees to cooperate in the capitol attack investigation. well now today, one day before

he was scheduled to testify about that investigation, trump white house chief of staff mark meadows has changed his mind and decides, actually, he's not going to cooperate after all. mr. meadows said today that reversal is in part because the investigation has subpoenaed his phone records. cnn has reported tonight the january 6th investigation has subpoenaed phone records from over 100 people, including trump white house chief of staff mark meadows, and numerous other trump officials. and it's not like the investigation was just asking these folks to hand over their phone records and these people have to decide what to do with the request. the investigation went to the phone companies directly. they're getting the information via subpoenas to the phone companies. according to this new reporting, the committee has begun receiving data from phone providers from multiple witnesses. now that appears to have freaked out former officials like mark meadows who presumably don't want to answer questions about who they spoke with on the phone on january 6th and what they spoke about. one point of interest i will point out, even though mark

meadows now says he changed his mind and is not going to cooperate with the january 6th investigation, he notably is not saying that he's going to plead the fifth or invoke his fifth amendment rights against self-incrimination. and that's notable because that is becoming an increasingly popular tactic from other trump world figures august up in the january 6th inquiry. tonight, for example, we learned longtime trump adviser roger stone will plead the fifth. in so doing, he will join john eastman and trump justice department official jeffrey clark, both of whom sought to overturn election results in the days before january 6th and now told the committee they are pleading the fifth. roger stone now joining them in doing so. mark meadows is apparently not going to do that. january 6th investigators have told mr. meadows that they still expect him to tell them what he knows. today, the leaders of that investigation, the chairman, democratic congressman bennie thompson, the vice chair, liz cheney, released a statement

about meadows. it says in part, quote, tomorrow's deposition, which was scheduled at mark meadows' request, will go forward as planned. if indeed mr. meadows refuses to appear, the committee will have no choice but to recommend contempt proceedings and recommend that the body in which mr. meadows once served now refers him for criminal prosecution. in other words, they're threatening explicitly if he doesn't show up at 10:00 tomorrow for that deposition, he's likely to be the next member of trump world to be facing potential prison time after a justice department criminal prosecution for contempt. this is getting good. watch this space. . don't just put on a light show—be the light show. make your nights anything but silent. and ride in a sleigh that really slays. because in a cadillac, tradition is yours to define. so visit a cadillac showroom, and start celebrating today.

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all right. that is going to do it for us tonight. i'll see you again this time tomorrow. "way too early" is up next. ♪♪ leaders from capitol hill reach a deal to avoid the nation's first ever debt default. it's a complicated process so the question is how soon can lawmakers get it done? plus, two steps back for the house investigation in the january 6th capitol attack. mark meadows is backing out of his deal to cooperate, while roger stone, he's pleading the fifth. the question is how will the committee respond? and president biden warns vladimir putin about russia's military buildup near the border of ukraine. the question is will that lead to a diplomatic solution? "way too early" for this.